


You're Not Supposed to Stare Directly at the Sun

by imaginarycircus



Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Angst, Grief/Mourning, M/M, Pre-Slash, September 11 Attacks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-11
Updated: 2012-09-11
Packaged: 2017-11-14 01:30:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,339
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/509867
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/imaginarycircus/pseuds/imaginarycircus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>On the 11th anniversary Danny remembers what happened that day and things he's never been able to talk about.</p>
            </blockquote>





	You're Not Supposed to Stare Directly at the Sun

**Author's Note:**

> I've thought about writing this story for a few years, but it never felt right. For some reason this year it felt OK to do it. It's a sensitive subject and I hope to hell I've handled it with respect.

It's exceptionally weird to be sitting on the beach in Hawaii on this day, toes wriggling down to where the sand is cool and damp. People who didn't grow up in the tri-state area don't understand the pull that New York City has on everyone near it. It's like the sun at the center of a small galaxy, pulling everyone into ellipses around it. Hawaii might as well be another planet, orbiting another sun.

He's clutching a beer, but it's gone warm and the label is soft from condensation. He runs his fingers over the wrinkles in it, but he doesn't drink it. It doesn't seem right.

Danny called his dad first thing this morning, just to say hello--just to connect and hear his gruff voice. They don't talk about what happened. They don't share on that level, but the sound of his father taking a swallow of that God awful stuff he calls coffee and then clearing his throat is enough. Conversations with his father include long stretches of quiet, in counterpoint to Danny who takes after his mother. She is in constant motion, constantly talking.

His mother talks about it when his father hands the phone over. She tells Danny that they watched the footage replay on TV this morning, which Danny could never bring himself to do. Not even the day it happened. Of course he went in as soon as he could get there to help out. It was miserable work, but it's always better to have something to do, to feel useful. His mother tells him about Mrs. Delaney down the street whose son was in Tower One. Every year she tells him how Mrs. Delaney is doing. It's never good. She always goes to the memorial service and then she doesn't come out of her house for a week after and when she does she looks peaked. His mother always says Mrs. Delaney looks "peaked."

"Danny?" Steve sits down on the sand next to him. He didn't say anything when he opened the door to let Danny in, just handed him a beer and let him go outside onto the beach alone.

Danny glances over at him, but doesn't say anything. He can't talk about it. Can't explain how he was in the station lecturing people not to leave the empty fucking coffee pot on the burner because it could explode and take someone's eye out--when the station went abruptly, eerily, miserably silent. Danny turned. Everyone was gathered around Henderson's desk. Something about their expressions made Danny set the empty glass pot back on the burner.

People have their hands over their open mouths. Diaz is tearing up. Diaz, who didn't make a sound, didn't flinch when he was shot in the gut, or when he had to pull that ten year old out of that wrecked Subaru, or any of the other times he's seen something unforgivably wrong.

The only sounds in the room are Danny's feet clicking against the linoleum and the announcer on Henderson's tiny two-inch portable TV, the one he uses to check in on Yankees games.

The announcer isn't making any sense because planes don't fly into buildings like that. Danny pushes in front of Walker because she's taller than he is and therefore can see over him. She doesn't even seem to notice. He watches as the tiny screen shows the tower go down, pancaking as it goes. Somehow the tiny screen just emphasizes the enormity of what's happening. He's seen the towers a million times, but he's never been up to the observation deck because that's the kind of stuff tourists do.

He and Walker drive out to Jersey City, listening intently to dispatch the entire way. They see the black smoke pouring into the sky before they get out of the car. They walk to the edge of the river because they need to see it. To witness. When the second tower falls Walker steps closer to Danny. He grabs her arm and they just stand there staring at the bizarrely altered skyline. Neither of them has anything to say. There is nothing to say. At some point Danny realizes he is clutching his free hand in his hair and his scalp is aching.

They're surrounded by other people, all riveted, all staring across the gray-blue Hudson at southern Manhattan. Except you're not supposed to stare directly at the sun. It burns out your retinas. Danny wonders if he'll ever stop seeing what he's seeing, or if it will be superimposed over everything he looks at for the rest of his life.

When they go back to the station they find Diaz sweeping up broken glass from the coffee pot. There's blood and Danny feels sick.

"What happened?" Danny knows what happened. The damn coffee pot burst and it's his fault.

"Mindy was walking by. Her arm got nicked. Just a few stitches."

"Shit," Danny says.

"Yep," Diaz agrees.

The rest of his shift Danny spends staring at his computer screen while the little green cursor blinks and blinks at him. He heads home and when he walks into the house Rachel hurries into his arms. Her eyes are red rimmed and swollen. He holds her and absently pats her back.

They tacitly agree not to turn on the TV. Grace is playing quietly on the floor with a herd of little plastic ponies. Danny squats down and kisses her on the head. He breathes in her smell--like No More Tears shampoo mingled with a scent that is just Grace herself. It's not like anything else in the world. It's the most real thing he's done all day. It anchors him back into reality.

The following weeks are a blur. Danny goes in to volunteer when he's off duty and when guys from his station are sent to help. He doesn't talk about what he sees, what he has to do, the things he finds, doesn't say a word to anyone. Even when they do a critical incident stress debriefing he doesn't have much to say. He tells the shrink about one thing because he has to share something. It's mandatory. He found a toddler sized mitten, which seemed an especially odd thing to find in September. What he doesn't share is where he found it--clutched in the fist of a dead woman. Danny will never know why she was trying to carry a mitten out of the building. It bugs him that he'll never know why that mitten was important, or maybe that it wasn't important at all, but just random happenstance. He dreams about that mitten sometimes. It was navy blue with a white snow flake pattern. The tip was caked gray with dust, but the bottom where the woman had clasped it was pristine.

Danny comes back into his body, back to Hawaii and swallows around the lump in his throat. It's getting dark and his toes are cold. Steve is staring at him in that way he has, like he can see inside Danny and he understands how he works.

And the words spill out, all the ones he's never said. He tells Steve about the tiny television, the acrid smell that just wouldn't go away, the dust, the broken skyline, the exploding coffee pot, and even the stupid mitten.

Steve listens without making a sound until Danny is talked out and it's late. Then he gets up and goes in the house, but comes right back out. He exchanges Danny's warm beer with a cold one. This one Danny drinks. He stares up at the dark sky and he doesn't see the broken skyline of Manhattan superimposed over it. He just sees endless navy sky dotted with stars. Well, except that one that's moving. That's a plane. He looks over at Steve, who still has those patient blue eyes trained on Danny's face. And Danny feels as if he's really seeing what's right in front of him for the first time in a long damn time.


End file.
